The Core Problem

Krishna is not a mere speaker of words, but a knower of the hearts of those to whom he speaks. Going directly to the root of Arjuna’s hesitation in the face of battle, he says to him: “Still I can see it: a doubt that lingers deep in your heart brought forth by delusion. You doubt the truth of the living Atman. Where is your sword, Discrimination? Draw it and slash delusion to pieces. Then arise O son of Bharata: take your stand in Karma Yoga.”1

Doubting the Self

There are doubts that are rational and doubts that are irrational. Relative experience has dominated us for creation cycles, so it is really only “reasonable” that we might doubt the glorious truth of the Self–not the fact that It exists, but the fullness of Its wonder and its transforming, creative, transcendent power, what to speak of its accessibility through yoga. It is, of course, delusion that hides the reality of the Self from us and makes us doubt the words of Krishna and the sages of the upanishads upon whose teachings the Gita is based. Yoga, however, directly reveals to us “the truth of the living Atman” and removes doubt as the rising sun dispels even the densest darkness.

The sword

Before we experience the Self, however, we must set our will to practice yoga for its revelation. This requires some intellectual conviction. We need to analyze our entire life, and especially our consciousness of it, for that consciousness is our Self. We need to distinguish (discriminate) between that which is experiencing our life and that which is experienced. One is unchanging and the other is ever changing. We must look to the unchanging and know that as real, and understand the shifting patterns of light and shadow around us as a dream–necessary and instructive, but for all that only a dream. With the sword of our discrimination, then, we can pierce through the veils that hide the truth from us and cast them aside forever.

Arise!

Positive action is required of us–not a running about and making noise as is the way of so much religion, but an interior activity: meditation. We must express in our outer life the insight meditation has given us. Then we can fight the battle of life from within the fortress of Right Action, of Karma Yoga.

Arjuna

At all times we are Arjuna, needing to heed the life-evoking words of Krishna, words that are the doors to freedom in the Self–in God.

More Bhagavad Gita Commentary by Swami Nirmalananda:
• A Practical Suggestion on Studying the Gita
1. The Battlefield of the Mind 2. The Smile of Krishna 3. Right But Wrong 4. Birth and Death–The Great Illusions 5. Experiencing The Unreal 6. The Unreal and the Real 7. The Body and the Spirit 8. Know the Atman! 9. Practical Self-Knowledge 10. Perspective on Birth and Death 11. The Wonder of the Atman 12. The Indestructible Self 13. “Happy The Warrior” 14. The Virtues of Karma Yoga 15. Religiosity Versus Religion 16. Perspective on Scriptures 17. How Not To Act 18. How To Act 19. How To Be Miserable; How To Be Free 20. Wisdom About the Wise 21. Wisdom about both the Foolish and the Wise 22. The Way of Peace 23. Calming the Storm 24. First Steps in Karma Yoga 25. From the Beginning to the End 26. The Real “Doers” 27. Our Spiritual Marching Orders 28. Freedom From Karma 29. “Nature” 30. Swadharma 31. In the Grip of the Monster 32. “Devotee and Friend” 33. The Eternal Being 34. Worshippers and the Worshipped 35. Caste and Karma 36. Action–Divine and Human 37. The Mystery of Action and Inaction 38. The Wise in Action 39. Sacrificial Offerings 40. The Worship of Brahman 41. The Core Problem 42. Action–Renounced and Performed 43. Freedom (Moksha)	44. The Brahman-Knower 45. The Goal of Karma Yoga 46. The Will of the Wise 47. The Yogi’s Retreat 48. The Yogi’s Inner Life 49. Union With Brahman 50. The Yogi’s Future 51. Success in Yoga 52. The Net and Its Weaver 53. Those Who Seek God 54. Those Who Worship God and the Gods 55. The Veil in the Mind 56. The Big Picture 57. The Sure Way To Realize God 58. Day, Night, and the Two Paths 59. The Supreme Knowledge 60. Universal Being 61. Maya–Its Dupes and Its Knowers 62. “Shall Not” Versus “Can Not” 63. Going To God 64. Wisdom and Knowing 65. Going To The Source 66. From Hearing To Seeing 67. The Wisdom of Devotion 68. Right Conduct 69. The Field and Its Knower 70. Interaction of Purusha and Prakriti 71. Seeing The One Within the All 72. The Three Gunas–Part One 73. The Cosmic Tree 74. Freedom 75. The All-pervading Reality 76. The Divine and the Demonic 77. Faith and the Three Gunas 78. Food and the Three Gunas 79. Worship and Discipline and the Gunas 80. Tapasya and the Gunas 81. Sannyasa and Tyaga 82. Deeper Insights On Action 83. The Three Gunas: Intellect and Firmness 84. The Three Kinds of Happiness 85. Freedom 86. The Great Devotee 87. The Final Words

Read the Bhagavad Gita online: The English text of the Gita posted on this Web Site is arranged according to the meter of the original Sanskrit text so it can be sung–as it is done every morning in our ashram and in most of the ashrams of India.